Emotional Pres. Obama tears up addressing campaign staff (video)

A touching video of President Obama thanking about 800 of his campaign staff yesterday. In the middle of the speech, at about 3:25, his voice starts to crack, and tears start rolling down his cheeks. After the speech he hugged and shook hands with all 800 staffers.

John AravosisFollow me on Twitter: @aravosis | @americablog | @americabloggay | Facebook | Instagram | Google+ | LinkedIn. John Aravosis is the Executive Editor of AMERICAblog, which he founded in 2004. He has a joint law degree (JD) and masters in Foreign Service from Georgetown; and has worked in the US Senate, World Bank, Children's Defense Fund, the United Nations Development Programme, and as a stringer for the Economist. He is a frequent TV pundit, having appeared on the O'Reilly Factor, Hardball, World News Tonight, Nightline, AM Joy & Reliable Sources, among others. John lives in Washington, DC. John's article archive.

I saw this video and thought it was lovely, but also that he looked SO. TIRED. I hope he got to sleep in yesterday!

hollywoodstein

Still with the Reagan reference. I have made a long harangue out of the intuition that Reagan is Obama’s model of a successful presidency. He floated it on the campaign trail only to be immediately sanctioned. He has behaved in office as if Reagan is his model though it may have taken him 4 years to realize Tip O’Neill is dead.
And yet in his moment of triumph addressing his 2012 campaign team who fought against everything RR enabled, Obama can’t resist mentioning that in his own formative years Reagan had just been elected and was wildly popular. Obviously, Ronald Reagan’s moment of popularity made a lifelong impression on not so young Obama. Whether wingers or dailykosmonauts want to realize it Reagan is Obama’s paragon.
Hopefully, an analysis of this weeks election results will enable Obama to realize his Reagan is dead.

emjayay

Here’s the thing. Humans, even seemingly not that overtly emotional ones (including me) sometimes get a little overcome by emotion when they perhaps least expect it. It has to do with the subconscious or unconscious or whatever psychologists are calling it these days. It does say something about one’s true feelings, if maybe hard to figure out exactly. Questions about sincerity are beside the point. (OK, unless it was maybe Mitt Romney or his extremely privileged wife expressing hurt over having been questioned about their extreme level of privilege in any way). Oh, and Hillary might have been a bit more figured out in New Hampshire, but I don’t think she as entirely acting either.

emjayay

There is no reason ever to censor anything. (OK, a few state secrets, temporarily) I appreciate seeing this as a little window into who the president is. I can’t imagine oh for example Romney ever expressing anything as honest or as admirable either. Of course over on Yahoo News comments, all the reactionary morons are going on about how fake Obama was in this video etc. So what. That’s what they do, when they’re not calling him a Muslim and a dictator and a liar and a Kenyan and comparing his wife to a gorilla etc.

hollywoodstein

Hopefully, he will feel this same way for his base, and not sell them out either.

jixter

Hmmm. Did this video really need to be released? Even if President Obama was sincere in his tearfulness – and I’m in no position to judge that – don’t you suppose that somebody might have suggested to his team that making it public would render it contrived and suspect? Kinda reminds me of that Phil Ochs song with the line: “Show me a picture of the pain”. (Don’t know which song; I’ve never been much of a fan) It also sort of reminds me of that Hillary Clinton video from way, way back showing her doing, pretty much, the same in New Hampshire.

Compare this with Mittens who really threw his weight around just because his Daddy was governor of Michigan.

“You don’t want to help me kick that blond queer kid to the ground and cut off his hair? Do it anyway because my Daddy is powerful. You don’t want to kick queers out of my Mormon congregation in Massachusetts? Do it anyway because I’m governor and I have clout.”